Hello and welcome to living in the Lehigh Valley, where our focus is your health and wellness.

I'm your host, Brittany Sweeney.

What inspires you?

What motivates you to go the distance against all odds?

On this episode of Living in the Lehigh Valley, we meet a woman who showed us how to go the distance in her race against cancer.

Our own Grover Silcox brings us the story of this remarkable Lehigh Valley lady, a mother, a physician and an avid runner.

Now, she adds, cancer survivor to the list.

Grover, always great to see you.

Great to be here, Brit.

Yes, I. I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Amy Miller, a family practice doc in the Lehigh Valley who loves to run and participates in all kinds of running events, half marathons.

And last year, she got to you know, she was stopped in her tracks when she got a diagnosis of acute myeloid leukemia, a very aggressive cancer.

Now, it might have given her pause, but it didn't stop her.

She still ran.

She still worked out whenever she could.

And shortly after starting chemotherapy treatment, she ran in a half marathon.

Wow.

What an inspiration.

Unbelievable.

Well, she went through a whole lot.

But nine months after her initial diagnosis, she was found to be in remission.

She really seems like a real inspiration.

Does she bring that to her medical practice as well?

She does.

It was really a pleasure to watch her practice in action.

You know, I got to speak with some of her patients and her colleagues, and frankly, they all love her.

She sounds like an amazing woman.

She sure is, Brit.

Dr. Miller credits her family, friends, faith and running with helping her cross the finish line, so to speak.

Dr. Miller's world turned upside down when she was diagnosed last March with this aggressive leukemia and told she needed to start chemotherapy treatment immediately.

She had been training for a half marathon in April and couldn't believe it.

She told her doctors, I'm very active.

I can't go from 20 miles to no miles.

The cancer slowed her down, but it didn't stop her from working out and running competitively.

She had the grit to go the distance on the road and in her battle with cancer.

Dr. Amy Miller knows what it takes to go the distance.

As a runner, Mother of five, wife, family physician, friend, colleague and person of faith.

We commit her into your hands in Jesus name, Amen.

It's good seeing you!

She exudes a joyful, boundless energy, the ability to go, go, go, and lots of heart along the way.

But in March of 2023, while training for the St Luke's Half Marathon, something deadly got in her way and nearly stopped her in her tracks.

I was training for the St Luke's Half Marathon, which was April 26, 2023.

I was in full force training for the race, so I was scheduled to run ten miles that day.

Instead, I went into the hospital.

I felt fine.

I probably felt a little tired, a little slower, but I thought I was just getting older.

She could explain away, slowing down, but not the spontaneous bruising appearing on her body.

She got a blood test.

The results were abnormal.

So I go to the ER, you know, they saw my blood work and they knew that I couldn't go home and they immediately consulted the cancer care team.

The diagnosis was acute myeloid leukemia.

So a bone marrow cancer of the blood.

And what immediately followed was starting chemotherapy.

We love you, Eva.

Amy's husband, Greg, also a physician, turned to family, friends and faith for support.

I believe God is good, despite things happening that we don't understand.

I had a pastor that basically encouraged me to take every day by day.

Don't go beyond that.

Do what you can that day and then had a ton of support from my immediate family, friends, our church.

My workplace was unbelievable in helping me.

Amy's workplace.

You do find out how kind and gracious people are when you suffer if you allow them in.

And we found that to be true.

I will never forget that day.

She called and asked to speak to me directly.

I spoke to her on the phone.

I might tear up.

I'm sorry.

It’s a day I'll never forget.

And she.

She was actually crying and telling me that she was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia.

She told me that we would need to reschedule her patients.

She was concerned about that.

I left my area, which here in the back, and I went in Anne-Marie's office, closed the door and just burst into tears.

It's something you don't want to hear, but I'm so sorry.

We were here to support her.

She's part of our family, and we just took it from there.

Amy spent 21 days in the hospital at Lehigh Valley Health Network, where she received chemotherapy and blood transfusions.

As it happens, both Amy and Greg work for LVHN.

April 7th, which was Good Friday.

That year was when I got released from the hospital.

I was thankful to be home.

The race was scheduled April 26, and so here I am at fresh out of the hospital with a cancer diagnosis and fresh out of chemo and transfusions support.

I was like, There's no way I could run this race.

But she found a way.

I felt lots of things were happening to me, right?

Like, so the cancer cells were happening to me.

A blood infection happened to me.

Transfusions were happening to me.

Chemotherapy was happening to me.

So what I really felt by running or by putting one foot in front of the other that my body was actively and engaging and choosing to do something that it wanted to do.

And that really helped carry me through to look and see what I could do instead of what I couldn't do.

She began getting in shape to run the race one step at a time.

Something just overcame me.

I was like, I ran three miles.

Not the fastest, not the greatest, but I just kept on increasing the miles.

And I said, If I could do ten miles, you know, I could do this.

And I was like, I got to do this.

She completed her first round of chemo just in time to run in the half marathon.

I ran the race April 26, which was a Sunday, and then I started my second round of chemo, three days later.

Like fans along the raceway, Amy's colleagues at Lehigh Valley Physicians Group in Emmaus cheered her on through every twist turn and hurdle of her cancer journey.

And they were also there at the St Luke's Half Marathon that April, waving her across the finish line.

They literally were the fans that cheered me on.

They were at the finish line.

They wore their hot pink team Miller team, Doctor Miller shirts and they kept cheering me on all the way.

I would frequently visit my office during my medical leave when I was healthy enough and my counts were high enough.

And it was always such a blessing to go back and see them and reassure them that I was doing okay.

And they've been with me every step of the way.

And I love you guys.

We love you too.

group hug, group hug.

We supported her in any way we could.

She's a rock star and this woman has great reserve.

And she's like I said, she's very positive with everything.

I know when she was in the hospital, instead of driving to the hospital, she would walk back and forth from her house to there.

Amazing.

As for staff, you know, we all just love working with her, even though this is her story and we're just a little part of it.

It affected all of us.

Dr. Amy's patients also showed their love and support.

And all they wanted to say was let her know that she's, you know, in our hearts, in our prayers.

We're rooting for her.

And they were fine with seeing other physicians while she was gone.

But when she came back in November, they wanted to be back with her.

Your ears are like your dad's ears, She remembers things about their families and things she's prayed with them about.

So that's just a joy to have.

It's just a wonderful feeling.

You're doing great.

You know, really rooting for her the whole time and glad to see that she had the support of the community and her family and just was able to use her own internal strength to overcome it.

And here she is.

She's back.

And I'm very happy for that.

When Amy began her second round of treatments, complications followed with a blood infection and severely low blood count.

She went through it all.

Never stopping, always moving.

One foot in front of the other.

And after six months, test showed she had reached remission.

In October was when I was given the diagnosis of remission status.

And so I said, That's wonderful.

Let's celebrate it.

By doing another half marathon, the one in November.

And so the relentless runner, true to form, stepped up and ran in the St Luke's D and L race Fest in Easton a month after receiving her remission status.

The Bible says a joyful heart is good medicine, right?

And so I felt like God definitely during the journey gave me joy, which was great.

Medicine feels good.

Dr. Miller shared that running helped give her a sense of control over her illness and that her family, friends and colleagues helped her in her cancer journey.

Like fans cheering her on in a marathon, she's now in remission, but she'll be getting checkups for a while to make sure all is clear.

Grover you never know when your world is going to be turned upside down.

So Dr. Miller is really an inspiration for us.

When we hit a road bump, we can keep going and overcome that obstacle.

Yes, she is a great example and she hopes that her experience can help others in whatever obstacles that they might face.

She's also very grateful to medical science and its advances in cancer treatment.

She said that 20 years ago she might not have gotten the prognosis that she got this time.

Sure, we are very happy that she was willing to share her story.

And thank you for telling it.

You're welcome, Grover.

Always good to see you.

And that'll do it for this edition of Living in the Lehigh Valley.

I'm Brittany Sweeney, hoping you stay happy and healthy.